1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method of easily and reliably connecting the conductor of a lead wire to the shield of a shielded cable such as a braid. This invention also relates to a shielded cable, with a lead wire connected thereto by the above method.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIGS. 6 and 7 show a conventional shield connection means for a shielded cable disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Unexamined Publication No. 6-349532.
This connection means, as shown in FIG. 6, consists of exposing a shielding braid 32 from a shielded cable 31, fitting a relay connecting element in the form of a metallic sleeve terminal 33 over the braid 32 and, as shown in FIG. 7, inserting a terminal 35 attached at the end of the shielded cable 31 into a connector housing 34 to bring a skirt 37 of the sleeve terminal 33 into contact with a shielding metallic shell 36 of the connector housing 34.
The terminal 35 is crimped on, and connected to, the conductor 38 of the shielded cable 31. The conductor 38 is covered with an inner cover 39. The braid 32 is disposed peripherally around the inner cover 39 and is in turn covered with an outer cover 40. The connector housing 34, the terminal 35 and the metallic shell 36 constitute a connector 41. On fitting a mating connector (not shown) to the connector 41, the metallic shell 36, and thus the braid 32 of the shielded cable 31, are connected to a not-shown metallic shell of the mating connector. The metallic shell 36 is grounded through the braid 32. It is to be noted here that the braid 32 may be replaced by copper foil, if desired, to constitute the shield.
With the conventional connection means, however, an operator needs to do the troublesome work of peeling the outer cover 40 from the shielded cable 31 to expose the braid 32 and then fitting the sleeve terminal 33 over the braid 32, resulting many manhours spent in processing the end of the shielded cable 31. The connection of the braid 32 of the shielded cable 31 to the connector side (to the metallic shell 36 in the present example) has thus been troublesome. Further, due to the structure in which the sleeve terminal 33 is pressed on the braid 32, these elements tend to become loose relative to each other, resulting in a possible contact failure between them. Likewise, due to the structure in which the skirt 37 of the sleeve terminal 33 resiliently contacts the metallic shell 36, the force with which the skirt 37 contacts the metallic shell 36 tends to disadvantageously decrease as time elapses. Further, the skirt 37 of the sleeve terminal 33 is susceptible to deformation in case the shielded cable 31 is forcibly swung in a radial direction on FIG. 7, resulting in an incomplete contact with the metallic shell 36.